Soma Purana

This list is from http://www.davita.com/kidney-disease/diet-and-nutrition/lifestyle/top-15-healthy-foods-for-people-with-kidney-disease/e/5347 1. Red bell peppers 1/2 cup serving red bell pepper = 1 mg sodium, 88 mg potassium, 10 mg phosphorus low in  potassium ,  excellent source of vitamin C and vitamin A, as well as vitamin B6, folic acid and fiber.,  contain lycopene, an antioxidant that protects against certain cancers. 2. Cabbage 1/2 cup serving green cabbage = 6 mg sodium, 60 mg potassium, 9 mg phosphorus packed full of phytochemicals,  High in vitamin K, vitamin C and fiber, a good source of vitamin B6 and folic acid. Low in potassium 3. Cauliflower 1/2 cup serving boiled cauliflower = 9 mg sodium, 88 mg potassium, 20 mg phosphorus high in vitamin C and a good source of folate and fiber . packed full of indoles, glucosinolates and thiocyanates—compounds that help the liver neutralize toxic substances that could damage cell membranes and DNA. 4. Garlic

There seems to be natural decline in kidney function with againg . These two papers are highly technical and describe age related kidney deterioration. http://www.advancesinpd.com/adv90sup/2kidneysup90.html http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2901622/ Some noteworthy things that I could understand from these papers are as follows. Aging proceeds at different rates not only in different species but also in different organs and tissues of the same organism (2). Thus the function of the kidneys and lungs declines faster than the function of the brain and heart. As the kidney ages, about 25% of the glomeruli disappear by the fourth decade and one-half by the seventh decade (9). Between the ages of 20 and 90, they observed a decline in GFR from 122 to 65 ml/min or 1 ml/min/year. This rate of decline further accelerates after the age of 65, especially in individuals with hypertension (8).  serum creatinine remains unchanged probably because of simultaneous decrease in muscl

This is late posting, but I completed on 11/5/2014 500 days of Bikram yoga in 500 days! As of today I have done 529 yoga classes in 529 days.

I saw the following excerpt in a web site (http://www.yogawiz.com/askquestion/261/asanas-for-reducing-creatinine-in-blood-i-am-suffe.html) which seems useful for doing this asana correctly. "... sit on a yoga mat with spine straight and feet together, legs outstretched. Raise your right leg and place it against outside of the left knee with soles firm on the floor . Stretch your left arm and place fingers on toes if right foot, place the right arm around the back of your waist in such a way that your palm rests on the left hip bone. This is the first stage of this asana, before proceeding to the next level please practice this pose correctly. Throughout the exercise your spine should be straight and head should be in the upwards direction. Do not slouch as this will not only spoil the look of this pose but will also decrease the benefits provided by this pose. So to keep a check on your posture this exercise can be performed in front of a mirror. After taking the position, ta

I saw a brief interview on MSNBC this morning with a doctor,  "Zeke" Emanuel.  I was astounded by the topic and found this provocative article. I subscribe to his  views entirely. http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/014/09/why-i-hope-to-die-at-75/379329/

I always wanted to make short math videos for my class. I tried making my first video. Surporisingly, it was pretty easy and came out fine on the first attempt itself. http://www.youtube.com/attribution_link?a=1ygx_ZAgL0g&u=/watch%3Fv%3D43nMxh5lxoM%26feature%3Dem-upload_owner I don't know why the URL is so long.

I got a newsletter yesterday from my healthcare company. It provided a checklist of preventative care items that apply to me specifically (considering my age and gender). I was surprised; it included so many items and vaccines I was not aware were included. The one that caught my attention is Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm. I looked up and learned something. If our blood vessel is weak in a spot it widens or bulges like a car tire does (have you seen bulging occasionally on a worn tire?). Such a bulge is called  aneurysm. The blood vessel we are talking about is aorta which is a large artery that supplies blood to various parts of the body. Abdominal aorta is located in the abdomen.  Localized widening or bulging of a bdominal aorta is called  Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm. There! The problem with Abdominal aortic aneurysm is often it does not cause symptoms.  Rupture of an aortic aneurysm is a catastrophe  where blood escapes the aorta and the patient can quickly bleed to death. T

I sign up for MOOCs like crazy and then drop quite a few and settle on manageable number. Righ now I am pursuing three MOOCs. Introduction to Chemistry: Reactions and Ratios by Duke University: Another chemistry course! I took MIT's Solid State Chemistry before I was lost in that very broad course. This Duke's course is much narrower and I have benefited a great deal in getting a really good understanding. An Introduction to Interactive Programming in Python - Rice University: I already had taken two python courses before (Michigan and MIT). In this Rice course we will be developing several games. I am looking forward to this. Mechanical Behavior of Materials - MIT: I love this course. This is hard. This is hardcore mechanical engineering. There are so many topics in this course that I should have learned in my engineering college but never did because they were never taught.

When I read some statements by so called great people, I say to myself, wow! no wonder he (or she) is great. But then, they say somethings that trouble me. For instance, there is this swami called "Ravishankar." He seems to be bright, good natured, and seems to brought happiness to millions of people. But I see he is referred to as Sri Sri Ravishankar. Why Sri Sri? Even God gets only one Sri.  I saw a photo of him wearing a fabulous crown. I saw somewhere his statement "If you feel lonely and feel that no one loves you and cares for you - remember me." What does this means? If I remember you, my feelings disappear? If I remember you, you will love me and care for me? How?

Since the last time I reported I have completed the following MOOCs. Justice by Michael Sandel - Harvard U Introduction to Solid State Chemistry - MIT: really hard course!  Introduction to Computer Science and Programming Using Python - MIT another hard course Internet History, Technology, and Security - U of Michigan Programming for Everybody (Python) - U of Michigan So far I have completed 31 courses. In the last two years, I took many biology related courses (e.g., Genetics, Epigenetics, Programmed Cell Death). I am now focusing on computer science and chemistry. Right now, I am pursuing another chemistry course. The rate of MOOCs has dropped somewhat, primarily because the courses I am taking now are harder courses (I took harder courses before also but they were interspersed with somewhat easier courses).

On 6/26/2014 I completed 365 days of Bikram yoga in a row. (actually,   I cheated a little. I missed two days due to travel, but made it up by doing doubles on two other days. So, it is more like 365 classes in 365 days). I never felt like not going to yoga on any day, even though, I did feel some days were more difficult. Come to think of it, it is a remarkable feat. It required a lot of planning to make sure I go to some class on every day. This meant the following. I had to avoid being sick enough to skip a day.  At my age, just being fit enough to go to a yoga class every day for 365 days is itself an achievement. don't plan on going to the last class for the day; something could happen like a friend visiting. Today it is day 406. I missed one day, gain due to travel. I plan to do a double soon to make it up. I intend to finish 500 yoga classes in 500 days. Not planning on 1000 classes in 1000 days; that would be too much.

I am sure I will get into trouble for this post. bhajagovindam bhajagovindam govindam bhajamuudhamate sampraapte sannihite kaale nahi nahi rakshati dukrijnkarane The general meaning of this sloka is " Worship Govinda, Worship Govinda, Worship Govinda. , O fool! when the appointed time (for departure) comes, the repetition of grammatical rules will not, indeed, save you." "Grammar" is just an example. Shankara refers to what we immerse in, in general, in our daily lives devoid of Bhakthi (devotion). You could replace grammar with calculus, work, or pretty much anything else. Really? How does Shankara know? "When the time comes" refers to the last moment, basically transition from life to death. At that moment, nothing really matters. Shankara probably is referring to life after death. Is there life after death? Any evidence?  My theory is whatever we do during our lives should be with the purpose or improving our well being and happiness during

Lawrence Summers has written an excellent article on the current economics rock star Picketty. http://www.democracyjournal.org/33/the-inequality-puzzle.php?page=all http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Piketty The Frenchman earned his PhD when he was 22 and became a professor at MIT at 22. He now heads an institute he spurred in France. Picketty probably will get Nobel Prize for his monumental work in wealth inequality studies. I haven't yet read his 700-page highly acclaimed recent book  Capital in the Twenty-First Century .   Lawrence says " His argument is that capital or wealth grows at the rate of return to capital, a rate that normally exceeds the economic growth rate. Thus, economies will tend to have ever-increasing ratios of wealth to income, barring huge disturbances like wars and depressions. Since wealth is highly concentrated, it follows that inequality will tend to increase without bound until a policy change is introduced or some kind of catastrophe inte

I have just begun to learn Kant, an 18th century philosopher. Kant emphasized reason and freedom. What is freedom? If I suddenly have an urge to drink soda and have before me Sprite and Pepsi, and I chose Pepsi, did I exercise freedom? I chose Pepsi on my own accord. But, what drove me to look for soda in the first place? Freedom is not acting in a free manner to chose the means to achieve a given end. Freedom is in choosing the end itself. Oftentimes we are instruments rather than authors of the purposes we pursue. This freedom to choose the end itself is what gives us dignity. Kant's conception of morality: What makes an action worthy? What makes an action worthy is not the end result but the motive behind the action, the quality of the will that led to the action (doing the right thing for the right reason). Kant says "a good will shines like a jewel even if fails to accomplishes nothing." Motive confers moral worth of an action. Kant gives an example.

I want to approach this question differently. Rather than make a subjective pronouncement based on what comes to my head right away, I want to start with the notion, I have no clue, but let me try to figure it out. Suppose people are allowed to sell their one kidney. We have two kidneys, presumably, for a reason. May be it is for redundancy, if one fails the other one is sufficient to maintain life. Or for the proper function both kidneys need to be working and with only one kidney, may be life is deficient. If we consider the redundancy reasoning and if we assume failure of kidney is highly likely after a certain age, then there is the question of seller's remorse. But unlike seller's remorse where the seller sold his stock in stock market at a low price and later the price doubled, here we are talking about life and death. The stakes are high. If we didn't have flood insurance and our house is washed away in a tsunami, we say, well it is only the house. But, we can

Military recruitment is going down in US. There are three ways of increasing the recruitment. Increase pay Implement conscription Hire mercenaries. During Civil War, US adopted a combination strategy conscription and mercenaries. Andrew Carnegie who was drafted could hire a substitute mercenary and send him in his place. He paid the mercenary a few hundred dollars which was less than what he would spend in a year for his fancy cigars. Strange system but that was allowed during Civil War. Even voluntary army has an element of coercion. Those who are economically poor and cannot get any job opportunity are "coerced" to join the military. I like conscription. I would like to combine that with increasing pay, may be double it. Conscription forces the society to think carefully about what wars we should engage in and limits the wars to truly what is essential to defend the borders. This should reduce the size of the military, not increase it. I was highly moti

When I registered, I accidentally chose audit. The EdX webpage was done in such a way that it gave the impression that you had only two options. One was audit or another was paid verified certificate. I didn't want to pay, so I chose audit. But there indeed was free honor certificate option as well but it was not clear how to sign up for it. Later I found out how to navigate to sign up for that option. In any case, I sent a mail to EdX and they couldn't reverse my audit status. I added a comment on the discussion board. The professor intervened and I got the certificate. I spent so much time on this course and it felt good to receive certificate acknowledging my accomplishment. 

I am planning to take computer science courses this year. I did biology related courses mainly in 2013. Comp Sci is hard. I learned some Python programming - want to improve my programming over the year. Programming is essential for pretty much all Comp Sci courses. I just started Stanford's "Algorithms: Design and Analysis Part 1". Lots of lectures. I am sure this course is going to be overwhelming. Let us see how it goes.

I am continuing MOOCs with the same vigor as before. Started MOOCs in Sep. 2012. So far I have completed 28 courses. My latest MOOC completion with distinction is "How Viruses cause Disease" by Prof Vincent Rcaniello of Columbia U. I also completed Jason Hafner's (Rice U) Electricity and Magnetism and passed it with 92% (>85% is A) but didn't get the certificate, because, I found out when I registered I accidentally chose audit only. I am right now studying Python programming, and a MOOC course called "Justice" from Harvard.

Unalienable right to life is one of the most difficult rights to enforce when it comes to taking one's life. If a person decides to kill himself, if he does not succeed, he will be punished (I guess) but probably mildly. He can attempt again. If he succeeds, it is done, there is nothing anyone or any government can do. In a normal trade, there is a seller and a buyer. In suicide, there is a seller, But who is the buyer? There is no buyer. Therefore, it is not a transaction and therefore, you cannot claim it be illegitimate. You cannot even claim it to be immoral? Who has done the immoral act? The person doesn't exist anymore. The person who killed himself is only in memory, thought. What about war? The war scenario seems more useful to discuss it would appear. In the case of a soldier who is killed in battle, did the soldier have the right to engage in an activity where the likelihood of getting killed (thus giving up his life) is high. At least here, there is an act

I have been reading political and moral philosophy by Bentham, John Stewart Mill, Robert Nozick, John Locke. Absolute right in our life that a pure libertarian would assert is not something majority would agree and can be expected. I can donate a kidney (if I have two working kidneys) to save the life of a loved one. But no doctor would take my healthy heart even if I wholeheartedly(!) agree to save the life of a loved one. Kidney and heart are both parts of my body but I seem to have different levels of right to them. If I want to donate my hair, no one would quibble with that right. If I am suffering from a terrible chronic hopeless condition, do I have a right to end my life? If I try and don't succeed, I will be punished by the government. If I succeed.... If I give away my car, I cannot claim it back. If I give away myself to slavery, by the same logic, I cannot claim it back. The car example seems just. But the inability to claim back the right to our self that wa

This was a 9 week EdX course offered by Caltech (Professor Antonio Rangel). This was the toughest course I have taken so far. I just scraped through and got my certificate. In spite of the frustration it caused, I think it was well worth it. I understood so many concepts that I was not aware of such as dead weight loss, Pigouvian tax, impact of government policies on consumer surplus, producer surplus. The calculus part is that difficult (it does involve some partial derivatives, but is is mostly single variable calculus) but requires a lot of thinking. Right now I have three more ongoing MOOCs, Virology (How viruses cause disease) from Columbia U, Electricity and Magnetism from Rice U, and Engineering systems in motion: dynamics of particles and bodies from Georgia Tech. The last course involves a lot of vector analysis and a little bit of vector calculus. E&M from Rice involves a lot of integral calculus, the course culminated in theory of electromagnetic waves which does invo

My yoga teacher made a profound statement one day in class. She said yoga is mostly unseen. I have been reflecting on this statement. Yoga generally has three main components, They are breathing, asanas, concentration/awareness. Asanas are externally observed and others can see it. Breathing is a technique and can be observed if the teacher looks at you closely. In a large class it is is difficult how well and correctly the students are breathing. But, the most important part of yoga, being aware and focused is totally unseen by the instructor or others. Only, the student practicing yoga knows it. 

I usually go for Bikram yoga in the morning (9:30AM class). Bikram requires consuming a lot of water an hour or two before yoga. Since I get up early anyway, this is not a problem for me. My morning fluid consumption involves the following. A large cup of coffee two large glasses of of ginger water one large glass of warm water with honey one large cup of tea I prepare ginger water as follows. I boil water. I add to it one or two inch slice ginger finely chopped. I add also one green chili finely chopped. I boil for couple more minutes. I filter the boiled finger water. Add a dash of Himalayan pink salt and squeeze one whole large lime. Add more water (about seven cups). I consume this during the day, mostly in the morning. Ginger has following benefits which are fairly well established through studies http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=72 effective in alleviating gastrointestinal distress reduces intestinal gas the biggest benefit is gingero

After learning a little about genetics and virology, I have come to the following conclusions. No organism  can live forever. All cells except neural cells need to be replaced at some point. This is done through cell replication. The mechanism of cell replication implies every time a cell replicates one end of each chromosome in the DNA genome called telomere is shortened. Eventually telomere is so short replication cannot occur. That starts the unavoidable decline and death. Neural cells cannot regenerate and therefore, evolution generally preserves these cells no matter what their condition is. All cells accumulate defects over time. These defects can be mutations in the genome or infections. There comes a point when the neurons have so much defect, even as they continue in the system, they are essentially non-functional. That starts the decline of brain health which includes memory and even the ability to control the functioning of the organism.

Not all cells and organs have the same degree of immune response. Some cells and organs cannot tolerate the accumulation of fluid, swelling, and inflammation and have naturally reduced immune response as a result. Examples are central nervous system, vitreous humor of the eye. Neurons don't regenerate and therefore have to block apoptosis. Some viruses take advantage of the reduced immuno response in these cells and organs and cause persistent infections. A type of persistent infection called latent infection can last the life time of the host. Many viruses attack the immune cells. HIV infects CD4 T-cells, macrophages, monocytes, and dendritic cells. Our body can replenish the immune cells and that is the reason AIDs is a very long persistent infection. After many years our body cannot make the immune cells in sufficient quantities leading to final collapse of our immune system and we finally die off of opportunistic infections.

We all give and take. I think what matters is the net. Some people give more than they take and some take more than they give. Quantifying this net is not easy. If you smile when you see another person, you both feel happy and there is only give for both. So, this is not necessarily a zero-sum game. Entropy of the universe increases with time no matter what. The question is do your actions accelerate the universal entropy increase? Or, do your actions help actually reduce the entropy? [I remember Samhita in my MAT251 - Calc III class coming at the end of the class to the desk and arranging neatly the quizzes strewn over the desk by other students. What a nice effort to reduce disorganization which works towards reducing entropy.] In general, a teacher, any teacher, gives more than he or she takes. Generally, people at the lower end of the economic scale like workers in restaurants, sanitation workers, a bus or train conductor give more than they take. A researcher gives mor

I have always wondered whether a physician can really understand the condition of the patient unless the doctor himself (or herself) has experienced it. I haven't had a headache, so I don't really know what it feels like to have a headache. Sometimes, I say it gives me a headache and I don't really mean that, it is just a matter of saying. Is the doctor's knowledge bookish? Different patients may have different levels of tolerance to the pain. How do you exactly quantify the level of pain? Shooting pain, stabbing pain, throbbing pain.. What do these things really mean? Health is of course much more than pain related. Blood pressure may be asymptomatic. You may not feel a thing but you could be sick. It looks like a doctor's job is enormously complicated.

Not necessarily! There are several serotypes. The fifth serotype was discovered in 2013. " While they are all closely related to each other, infection with one serotype only offers limited and temporary immunity against other serotypes. In fact, multiple infections with different types of dengue increase the risk of severe dengue infections such as dengue hemorrhagic fever and dengue shock syndrome. - See more at: http://healthmap.org/site/diseasedaily/article/fifth-dengue-serotype-discovered-102513#sthash.2hf8yqoI.dpuf" If you had the first infection with DENV-1 and later got the second infection with DENV-2, the antibodies you generate will bind to the virus DENV-2 but cannot prevent infection. Dengue can be extremely debilitating. There is no vaccine or cure for dengue at this time.

There are very few viruses that cause tissue damage. These are called cytolytic viruses. Most viruses are non-cytolytic. Clinical symptoms of viral disease (fever, aches, pains, nausea, malaise) are caused by our immune system's response to infection. This is why immunopathoplogy is called too much of a good thing. An enteroviral infection, and in particular to coxsackievirus B3, can cause extensive heart tissue damage (myocarditis) requiring heart transplant.  The heart tissue damage is caused by CTLs in our immune system (CTL is CD8 T  lymphocytes ). Perforin is a cytolytic protein found in CTLs and NK cells (natural killer cells), Mice  that have perforin knockout gene show no heart damage when  infected with Coxsackie B3.  Herpes stromal keratitis most common cause of blindness in developed countries is also mediated by CD4+ Th1 cells. In this case virus replicates in corneal epithelium but that is not the cause of the disease. The disease is caused by CD4+ Th1 which

I cannot think of humans in the previous centuries (>1000 years ago) hitting something constantly like we do on computer keyboards. Evolutionary response takes tens of thousands of years, so obviously we are not equipped to pound the keyboard and not suffer the consequences. I have a bad habit of hitting the keyboard harder than it needs to be and occasionally my fingers hurt. I have to remind myself to make it soft and use switch fingers (I am not a typist). Whenever we do something that requires applying force or (really, impulse) on parts of body due to technological changes, ask yourself, did my ancestors in may be a different activity have similar force/impulse on the same part of the body? If the answer is no, most likely you are not properly equipped to continue practice. Anyway, even after another ten thousand years, we won't be equipped to hit the keyboards hard since that type of activity is not going to affect "fitness" (in terms of being able to reprod

Epigenetics is a sexy subject for those who are not doing research on epigenetics. One thing I learned in a recent MOOC course I took on Epigenetics is there is no clear evidence of epigenetic changes passed on to offspring through gametes in humans. Epigenome is completely wiped out and reprogrammed during sensitive periods (primordial germ cell development and pre- and post-implantation periods). If you do see transgenerational epigenetic “inheritance” you must ask (a) are they transmitted transgenerationally, i.e., via gametes, or (b) brought about by mothering style, placenta alteration, newborn nutrition, etc. People (particularly, science journalists) are eager to claim true epigenetic inheritance through gametes referring to dutch famine, Overkalix, etc. However, subsequent careful studies did not indicate transgenerational effect of the famine. It is surprising that it is epigeneticists that caution about making sexy claims in epigenome inheritance. Others seem to liber

I used to have memory problems years ago. Now I don't. I hardly forget things now. I may not necessarily take action on things I remember, but I don't forget them. I still have one problem; I don't listen well. But I have improved in this area also. This is my new year resolution. Listen well. I don't know what caused my memory to improve. It could be one or more of the following. Started lots of online (MOOC) courses a little over a year ago. I have done 25 courses so far. This has been a lot of exercise to my brain. I am still continuing this.  I started Bikram yoga about a year ago. This has improved my strength. Yoga requires a lot of mental concentration, being very still in poses and out of poses, focus on breathing. My Mercer county college teaching. This is not a recent activity, I have been doing this for almost 18 years now. But it does require a lot of preparation and work to my brain. It may be that these days I feel I don't need to remember muc

Happiness is a strange thing. I remember, when I was in 10th grade, I lived with my uncle. One of my chores was to bike to the milk dairy and bring a bottle of milk. One day, I was a little bit late. When I reached the dairy there was a huge line. On many days milk runs out and I was doubtful if I would get milk. When I reached the counter there was just one bottle left and I got milk! I have never felt so much happiness, all that hard work to get there biking six miles each way notwithstanding. Incredible happiness for a bottle of milk?! If I didn't have milk, no coffee for the entire day for anyone at home. My uncle and aunt would be unhappy. My nephew and nieces would taunt me for getting up late. Happiness, I guess, is because I avoided all this potential unhappiness. In my place, the town collects recycling stuff every two weeks. One time, I didn't put it out for recycling. A lot had collected. I was very unhappy? Should I be unhappy? It would get collected in two we

Progeria is a genetic condition that accelerates aging. Sam's philosophy for a happy life: 1. Be OK with what you ultimately can't do, because there is so much you CAN do. 2. Surround yourself with people you want to be around. 3. Keep moving forward. [4. Never miss a party if you can help it.] Watch  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36m1o-tM05g

(Ref.  http://www.nj.com/education/2014/01/oldest_american_teacher_celebrates_100th_birthday_with_students_at_sundance_school.html ) Agnes Zhelesnik  is 100 years.  She joined Sundance school in North Plainfield, New Jersey when she was 81 as a home economics teacher and still continues to teach there. She has no plans of retiring. She teaches  cooking, sewing,  knitting and crocheting to  pre-K through Grade 5. Zhelesnik  has hardly missed a day, she had a little trouble one week in the last 20 years! She goes to school with her daughter who also teaches at the school (see them in the photo above). Watch  http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/americas-oldest-teacher-still-thriving-as-she-turns-100/

I am generalizing it based on my experience so far. There three companies. Coursera (coursera.org) EdX (edx.org) Udacity I have never taked a MOOC from Udacity. The reason I took Coursera and EdX courses is they mimic the regular university courses. They start and end on specific days, there are homeworks, quizzes, exams, etc. just like in college courses. I like this discipline. There are grades and one may or may not be able to earn a certificate. Most courses just give pass/fail (if fail, you don't get a certificate). Few courses do offer certificate with distinction. Coursera, currently, offers lot more courses than EdX. But EdX is catching up. You have a bigger choice of subjects with Coursera currently. In terms of standards and quality, both are far superior to colleges I have attended. But, in general, at least so far, EdX courses have lot more rigor and higher quality professors. Two toughest and highest quality MOOC courses I have taken so far are both EdX c

Chikungunya is caused bu chikungunya virus. This virus and disease were primarily confined to African countries transmitted to humans by a mosquito called Aedes aegypti. There was amino acid change due to mutation in  viral glycoprotein which made it possible to be spread a new mosquito species called A.albopictus. Now it is Africa, Asia, Europe, and Australia. The virus has been located also in US though cases of chikungunya is not yet prevalent.

Our skin is the largest organ in the body. The outermost layer is dead cells. So, we are pretty much dead outside. This provides the protection against viruses that are abundant in the air. The skin also has anti-microbial peptides made by our cells and bacteria. Skin is not perfect, we could still get infection through mosquito or animal bites, scratching, injuries. There are mucosal surfaces like respiratory tract, alimentary, urogenital tracts. These have epitheleal living cells that are suceptible to viral entry. We cannot seal these tracts with concrete because we need to breathe and eat to live. We take in 6 litres of air per minute. However, we have pretty good defenses. The epitheleal cells are covered with mucous which traps viruses. We make 20 to 200 ml of mucous per day in the respiratory tract. The virus particles trapped in mucous get swallowed through ciliary action. This happens 30 times per hour.

I copied the following from  http://academy.asm.org/images/stories/documents/Flu_web.pdf "Whenever you are infected by a pathogen, your immune system generates compounds called antibodies that bind to the infectious agent and target it for destruction. After the infection is cured, a few of the white blood cells that make those specific antibodies continue to circulate in your blood. Called “memory cells”, these cells are quickly activated if the same infectious agent attacks you again, preventing the infectious agent from establishing itself and preventing you from getting sick. That is why vaccination works: a vaccine presents the immune system with a harmless form of an infectious agent so that if you are infected by the real thing, your immune system will be primed to destroy it quickly" However, "...the last year’s flu victims will  not have immunity if they encounter a different subtype  or strain this year."

My new MOOCs are starting one after another after year end holidays. I always sign up for more than I can handle and eventually drop a few. I did some analysis and decided to basically focus in January on the following MOOC activities. 1. Finish up the classical mechanics final exam (starting tomorrow). Prepared intensely for this for more than two weeks. Really anxious about this. 2. Take the following two new MOOCs seriously a. Virology 2: How viruses cause disease? (Columbia U) b. Economics with Calculus (Caltech) 1/11/14 Update: Finished MIT's Classical Mechanics Final. Got 100%! I was a little bit apprehensive after Exam3 which was brutal. Prepared really hard. Feel so comfortable now with drawing free body diagrams, formulating and solving equations of motion for harmonic oscillations, mass-spring motion, angular momentum, all types of Newtonian dynamics.  Achieved 95% overall to satisfy for A in the course. This was the hardest course but also most satisfying among

The question is who is "me?" We often identify our body and mind with self. First, is mind different from body? Mind, I would say, is part of the body. After all, what is mind? It is amalgamation of thoughts, past and present aided by memory. The memory is physical space that stores information just as in a computer. Thoughts are the result of electrochemical interactions in the body. So thoughts and the mind are just manifestations of bodily processes. If we accept mind as part of the physical body, is there something else that I could characterize as real "me"? Some people may call it the soul. I want to call it the consciousness. Have you noticed the noun "consciousness" doesn't have the plural. Is it an omission on the part of grammarians or is consciousness really universal and a single entity? I would think the latter. So, your consciousness is the same as my consciousness. I would contend the real me is my consciousness. So, I am you and

I did the second double 8 am and 10 am again. Unlike the previous one on 12/29/13, this one was hard! I should have eaten a fruit or something before. With the previous one I had eaten some fruit before and took a couple of oranges to eat in between. I sat out several postures and felt terribly tired after the second one. Well, you learn from your mistakes.

Last night there was heavy snow still snowing hard when I woke up in the morning. Spent two hours shoveling snow, thought I would be tired for 9:30am Bikram. I was pleasantly surprised in Meredith's class. My legs felt stronger and less shaky in the balancing series. Perhaps I should run or do treadmill before yoga.  Perhaps one could ask why do we need strength in this modern age when we don't have to hunt or run f rom predators. The strength sure made all the shoveling a breeze. I marvel at the strength I have built up in the months of Bikram yoga when I carry easily the grocery bags all at once from the car inside. Besides carrying groceries, strength, more importantly, makes you preserve and improve muscle mass even as we age, we won't fatigue as easily, chronic conditions such as back pain disappear.

When I started Bikram yoga almost a year ago on Jan 6th 2013, I would feel tired, body aching, knees or some part of the body in intense pain for hours. People would tell me may be I shouldn't do yoga everyday but give the body a break between yoga days so it would do the necessary repair and regeneration. I ignored these advises and just continued my Bikram practice everyday non-stop (except for the time when I went India for a month - even there I went to Pathanjali Yoga). After many months now, my body has adjusted to my schedule and can deal with whatever repairs are needed. The body should be subservient to me, not the other way around. If the body tells me it needs 48 hours for all the repair between workouts, I tell the body "listen pal, I ain't giving you 48 hours. 24. Do it in 24." Some yoga instructors tell "listen to your body." Jess, my yoga instructor says, "if I listened to my body, I would still be on the couch." Even in a 90-